Navigating Early Childhood Education

Throughout Detroit, there is a clear need among families for better information about how the education system works. This is particularly crucial among families with young children who are about to enter our city’s complex and highly segmented education system. Additionally, the research is clear that kids who go to pre-school are much more successful than kids who do not.

With all this in mind, Excellent Schools Detroit asked for assistance to build awareness about the three major options for affordable pre-school for low-income families in Detroit: Head Start, the Great Start Readiness Program and a statewide Child Care Subsidy. I worked with Libby Cole and Kikko Paradela through The Work Department, a Detroit-based design firm. Using a human-centered approach, we gathered input from parents and education experts to inspire the content and design. We then tested prototypes with both English and Spanish speaking parents to inform the final product.

My Roles: Policy & Program Research Lead, User Research & Testing, Design Team

#CivicTech Coverage for Model D

In 2014, as a freelance writer I began covering civic and community technology for Model D, an online magazine telling the story about the people who are changing Detroit. Together the managing editor and I are working to develop a regular column that utilizes data journalism and infographics for storytelling.

UIX: Survey Development & Network Analysis

The Urban Innovation Exchange (UIX), an initiative funded by the Knight Foundation, showcases and advances Detroit’s growing social innovation movement. While I was at Data Driven Detroit (D3), which serves as the data partner for UIX, I acted as Project Manager of the UIX project. The project team created a survey to better understand innovators’ backgrounds, their projects, their support network, their perception of Detroit, and what they require to be successful. We then analyzed the survey data and the innovators’ support networks. Network analysis was done using Gephi.

Skillman 2012 State of the Detroit Child

Citing the fragmented nature of Detroit data, The Skillman Foundation asked Data Driven Detroit to compile a significant number of child-related indicators into one document, to provide a baseline. This report would be used to monitor and evaluate regional progress and also be updated on an annual basis.

D3 Communications Management

During my 3.5 years at Data Driven Detroit (D3), I assisted as both a Project Manger and as the Communications Manager. As the Communications Manager, my major role was to ensure that our publications and designed materials were of high quality and extended the D3 brand. While D3 culture promotes staff autonomy and freedom to develop their own products, I regularly provided feedback on design decisions. These included our website and interactive tools, data visualizations, charts & graphs, and design & copy of white papers and reports. I also served as the editor of both the newsletter and the blog.

Included here are some of the projects on which I provided feedback and support during my time as the communications manager:

UNICEF: Child Labor Survey Results

While interning with a social policy advisor at UNICEF Botswana in 2008, I spent the majority of my time analyzing data from the 2005/06 national child labor survey. A few years later that research was published in 2 separate publications.

My Role: Assisted with the development of analysis framework and data analysis, Developed basic summary charts & graphs, Writing and editing preliminary reports.

MFA Thesis: Ethiopian Childbirth Manual

Health Extension Workers are the foundation of Ethiopia’s new health decentralization program which aims to increase health coverage in the rural areas. These workers are based in areas where they are originally from; they are young and enthusiastic women and men trained in preventative care.

In summer of 2007, I lead a team of researchers in creating a visual literacy survey and needs assessment for Ethiopia’s community-based health workers in the Oromia region. We wanted to know what the role of health education and health education materials played in their daily activities. Determining what materials, images and visual aids would be most accessible to these workers and their specific context was also a significant part of our research.

The results of this research were applied directly to define the design environment for creating an illustrated childbirth resource manual. An evidence-based approach was used to determine the subject matter of this resource in addition to its size, level, language, design and layout of visual aids. Currently this 100 page manual is being translated and will hopefully be printed and distributed before the end of the year.

In addition, this research was accepted for presentation at Unite for Sight’s Global Health Conference at Yale University in April 2009.